Sherlock' a treat for audiences thanks to stars Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman

I was first introduced to the BBC show “Sherlock” sometime in the early months of 2012. I can trace it to around this time because the show was discussed on the Feb. 14 edition of the Hollywood Prospectus podcast on Grantland.com. The hosts, Chris Ryan and Andy Greenwald, talked about how “delightful” the show was and how charming the two leads in the show were. At that point, only the first series (season) had been released but it was available for streaming on Netflix.

At first I scoffed at the idea of giving “Sherlock” a shot because I was never a big fan of the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle tales (except for the time that the titular character was played by Wishbone) and was underwhelmed by the Guy Ritchie-directed, Robert Downey Jr.-starring “Sherlock Holmes,” which was still fresh in the public consciousness at that time. However, because the Hollywood Prospectus podcast had steered me in the right direction in the past (most notably with the cult comedy “Happy Endings”), I decided to heed their suggestion and check out “Sherlock” for myself.

And boy was I glad I did.

The first series of the BBC-produced drama was only three episodes long, but each episode ran for roughly 90 minutes, making it essentially a movie. And unlike the Ritchie-RDJ collaboration, which took place in the days of Doyle and was actually a movie, the television program took place in modern-day England and featured all the modern-day amenities that one might expect the world’s only consulting detective to use — things like cellular telephones, the Internet and refrigerators.

While the first episode, “A Study in Pink” (cleverly based on the original Holmes story “A Study in Scarlet”) was more of an introduction to the characters of Sherlock Holmes tales, including the titular detective, his trusty sidekick Dr. John Watson and police officer Inspector Lestrade, subsequent episodes were more classical hard-boiled detective stories, on par with anything that Doyle wrote.

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Although modernizing Sherlock Holmes is a clever plot mechanism, simply updating the setting is not enough to make the show interesting to watch. The CBS show “Elementary” is proof of that. What makes the show so enjoyable to watch, beyond the clever plot device and solid writing that keeps the viewer guessing throughout, is the aptly-noticed delightfulness and chemistry of stars Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman.

When the show first debuted, the two stars were not well known, especially in America. That was not a reflection on their talents, a fact that become apparent from the first episode. And because of their relative anonymity, the idea of the pair matching wits for years and years and years seemed not only enjoyable but incredibly plausible. In the years since the show first debuted, though, the rest of the world seemed to notice just how talented the two leads are and the pair have found themselves in a number of big-budget blockbusters. In fact, in this year alone, one (Freeman) played Bilbo Baggins in the eighth highest grossing film of 2013 (“The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug,” which also features the vocal talent of Cumberbatch) and the other played the iconic villain Khan Noonien Singh in the 11th highest grossing film (“Star Trek Into Darkness”). In addition to those films, Cumberbatch has appeared multiple Oscar-nominated films like “War Horse,” “Atonement” and “Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy” while Freeman, who was previously best-known for appearing in the original version of “The Office” as Tim Canterbury (who the American character of Jim Halpert was loosely based on) has continued to scratch his funny bone, appearing in all three of the Edgar Wright-Simon Pegg collaborations.

Even with their newfound glory, though, the pair remain committed to “Sherlock,” essentially forcing the creators and network to make a fourth series of the show, according to co-creator Stephen Moffat, and that fondness for the program from the starring duo goes a long way in explaining the clear on-screen chemistry between the pair.

If Cumberbatch and Freeman did not like each other, or did not enjoy doing the show, either of them could easily justify not returning to the show by citing their burgeoning film careers. Instead, the show will carry on and their pleasant charming on-screen presences will persist, much to the delight of audiences on both sides of the Atlantic.

Series three has already aired in England and can be found online if one looks hard enough. However, for those who are either not technologically savvy or believe that good things come to those who wait, the duo will return to American televisions starting on Jan. 19 as series three of “Sherlock” returns to “Masterpiece Mystery” on PBS at 9:58 p.m.